Tuesday, December 14, 2010

We took a much-needed respite from the hustle and bustle of the world this weekend, to be together as a family and just enjoy each other's company. Yousuf and I turned off our laptops and telephone ringers and sat down at the table to make some paper snowflakes with the kids. It was perfectly sweet and rejuvenating...and utterly hilarious.

Inara had never cut out snowflakes before and was entranced by the method of folding, cutting, unfolding and revealing her snowy creations. Before long, she was handling the scissors and snipping out some beautiful shapes of her own:

Not bad for her first time out!

Here was the one that I did with her. It's simple, but still classy...

And this one was supposed to be mine, but then Nissa claimed it for herself:

But somewhere in the midst of all that happy and sweet family fun, things took a decidedly competitive turn. I'd like to say that Yousuf started it, but that would be untrue. I totally egged him on. I was waving around my pretty little snowflakes when I noticed that he was concentrating. Really hard. Not a good sign. When he was done, he unfolded Darth Snowflake:

Be still my nerdling heart. What can I say, the man's got talent!

Not to be outdone, I grabbed the only weapon I could think of and went to town. I'm talking, of course, about the one thing that would take my fanciful flakes to the next level. Who would ever be able to resist a pretty, GLITTERY snowflake?

(By this time the girls had decided that the dustbunnies under the sideboard were far more interesting than whatever insanity their parents were indulging themselves in.)

Back to the snowflakes, people! Note the fine lines:

Note the perfect execution, the attention to detail...and most importantly, note the GLITTER:

Shiny!

But that crafty husband of mine wasn't ready to be outdone by glitter. Oh, no he wasn't. Before I could say, "Beat That, Boba Fett!" he unveiled his masterpiece:

As he was more than happy to point out, his snowflake contained not one but TWO different Star Wars characters in it. That's Advanced Snowflake-Making, in case you didn't know. I didn't. But what I did know was that I simply could not let this blatant one-upmanship go on any longer. It was supposed to be family time! We were supposed to be making warm fuzzy memories over hot chocolate and home-baked treats and birds chirping and snow falling and cute little woodland creatures dancing around us while singing Kumbaya.

Ahem.

Anywhoo - the point is that I decided to put Yousuf out of his misery by ending this snowflake peeing contest. I wasn't doing it for myself. I did it for THE CHILDREN.

(Yeah, right.)

Fist-pumpin' BOOYAH! In yo' snowflakin' face SUCKA.

(And no, I'm not competitive AT ALL.)

It was glorious! It was magnificent! It was THREE DIMENSIONAL!!!

It was also bigger than Inara's head.

Whatever. I WIN. And all is right with the world once again.

I LOVE family time!

The Star Wars snowflake template can be found here, and the 3D snowflake instructions are here. Happy family time, and happy (hopefully non-competitive) crafting! xoxoxmahreen

We took a much-needed respite from the hustle and bustle of the world this weekend, to be together as a family and just enjoy each other's company. Yousuf and I turned off our laptops and telephone ringers and sat down at the table to make some paper snowflakes with the kids. It was perfectly sweet and rejuvenating...and utterly hilarious.

Inara had never cut out snowflakes before and was entranced by the method of folding, cutting, unfolding and revealing her snowy creations. Before long, she was handling the scissors and snipping out some beautiful shapes of her own:

Not bad for her first time out!

Here was the one that I did with her. It's simple, but still classy...

And this one was supposed to be mine, but then Nissa claimed it for herself:

But somewhere in the midst of all that happy and sweet family fun, things took a decidedly competitive turn. I'd like to say that Yousuf started it, but that would be untrue. I totally egged him on. I was waving around my pretty little snowflakes when I noticed that he was concentrating. Really hard. Not a good sign. When he was done, he unfolded Darth Snowflake:

Be still my nerdling heart. What can I say, the man's got talent!

Not to be outdone, I grabbed the only weapon I could think of and went to town. I'm talking, of course, about the one thing that would take my fanciful flakes to the next level. Who would ever be able to resist a pretty, GLITTERY snowflake?

(By this time the girls had decided that the dustbunnies under the sideboard were far more interesting than whatever insanity their parents were indulging themselves in.)

Back to the snowflakes, people! Note the fine lines:

Note the perfect execution, the attention to detail...and most importantly, note the GLITTER:

Shiny!

But that crafty husband of mine wasn't ready to be outdone by glitter. Oh, no he wasn't. Before I could say, "Beat That, Boba Fett!" he unveiled his masterpiece:

As he was more than happy to point out, his snowflake contained not one but TWO different Star Wars characters in it. That's Advanced Snowflake-Making, in case you didn't know. I didn't. But what I did know was that I simply could not let this blatant one-upmanship go on any longer. It was supposed to be family time! We were supposed to be making warm fuzzy memories over hot chocolate and home-baked treats and birds chirping and snow falling and cute little woodland creatures dancing around us while singing Kumbaya.

Ahem.

Anywhoo - the point is that I decided to put Yousuf out of his misery by ending this snowflake peeing contest. I wasn't doing it for myself. I did it for THE CHILDREN.

(Yeah, right.)

Fist-pumpin' BOOYAH! In yo' snowflakin' face SUCKA.

(And no, I'm not competitive AT ALL.)

It was glorious! It was magnificent! It was THREE DIMENSIONAL!!!

It was also bigger than Inara's head.

Whatever. I WIN. And all is right with the world once again.

I LOVE family time!

The Star Wars snowflake template can be found here, and the 3D snowflake instructions are here. Happy family time, and happy (hopefully non-competitive) crafting! xoxoxmahreen